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Oh, this misconception. I'm sure you've never been so angry at society that you just didn't care anymore and wanted to break things. Maybe you haven't, because

Oh, this misconception. I'm sure you've never been so angry at society that you just didn't care anymore and wanted to break things. Maybe you haven't, because society isn't built to put you down and keep you there, the way it is for some people. Check your privilege. Either way, riots do raise awareness. You might hate the destructive people, but you do pay attention to them, and then you pay attention to the non-violent people who are with them.

Kalium 11y ago
Privilege checked! I have, in fact, been that angry. I just haven't made the mistake of assuming that that anger, expressed in the form of violence, will get me what I want. Especially since a recent study on the subject shows that the radical interpretation of riots you have just espoused is not consonant with history. Have you considered not making wild assumptions about me in an effort to invalidate my viewpoint?
- mentat 11y ago
  I'm still not seeing a lack of privilege in your discoverable profiles. As someone who has had privilege, I'm pretty sure I've never been that angry, and I've been very angry. Perhaps it's worth considering that you have not being either.
  - Kalium 11y ago
    "You haven't advertised a lack of privilege, therefore you must be overprivileged and wrong" is not the soundest of possible lines of reasoning. I will not debate the subject further. Nevermind the slight catch that privilege is not a binary thing. I understand rage. I understand feeling helpless. I know those feelings. I have felt those feelings. I could go on and on and on, making all the declarations of sympathy and empathy and understanding you could possibly wish for here. Yet, at no point did I come to believe that random destruction of property would get me what I wanted to relieve that all-consuming rage. Doubly so when evidence on the subject shows clearly that riots don't work. Whether or not I have felt a particular flavor of rage is immaterial to the question of whether or not riots are an efficacious means of producing social change. The former is a question of unknowable perceptions, while the latter is a question verifiable against reality to the extent that reality is objective. Might I ask you to consider the basic question of "Do riots work?" Or the related basic question of if desperately wanting something to be true makes it so?

Kalium 11y ago

Privilege checked! I have, in fact, been that angry. I just haven't made the mistake of assuming that that anger, expressed in the form of violence, will get me what I want. Especially since a recent study on the subject shows that the radical interpretation of riots you have just espoused is not consonant with history. Have you considered not making wild assumptions about me in an effort to invalidate my viewpoint?

mentat 11y ago
I'm still not seeing a lack of privilege in your discoverable profiles. As someone who has had privilege, I'm pretty sure I've never been that angry, and I've been very angry. Perhaps it's worth considering that you have not being either.
- Kalium 11y ago
  "You haven't advertised a lack of privilege, therefore you must be overprivileged and wrong" is not the soundest of possible lines of reasoning. I will not debate the subject further. Nevermind the slight catch that privilege is not a binary thing. I understand rage. I understand feeling helpless. I know those feelings. I have felt those feelings. I could go on and on and on, making all the declarations of sympathy and empathy and understanding you could possibly wish for here. Yet, at no point did I come to believe that random destruction of property would get me what I wanted to relieve that all-consuming rage. Doubly so when evidence on the subject shows clearly that riots don't work. Whether or not I have felt a particular flavor of rage is immaterial to the question of whether or not riots are an efficacious means of producing social change. The former is a question of unknowable perceptions, while the latter is a question verifiable against reality to the extent that reality is objective. Might I ask you to consider the basic question of "Do riots work?" Or the related basic question of if desperately wanting something to be true makes it so?